Free It's Murder at St. Basket's by James Lincoln Collier

a part of it.
    Mainly the City is a business place, kind of like Wall Street in New York, where there are stockbrokers and banks and things like that. Mr. Plainfìeld’s office was on Poultry Street—the English say “in Poultry Street”—number Six. On the note Leslie had given me, he had written “St. Paul’s, Central,” which meant that the closest subway stop was the one called St. Paul’s, on the Central Line.
    There weren’t any tube stops—that’s what they call subways in London—too near to St. Basket’s. There was one up on Hampstead High Street where Leslie had gone to phone that day, and one at a section called Belsize Park, near the movie theatre where Mrs. Rabbit likes to go. I thought about it for a minute as I walked along, and then I realized I didn’t really know which one was closest. I stopped, and took out one of the pennies I had collected, and flipped it: heads for Hampstead, tails for Belsize. I don’t know what happened—maybe the wind hit it or something, because usually I’m a good catcher, but I dropped it. It bounced on the sidewalk and rolled off the curb and under one of the cars parked in a row along there. I cursed, and bent down, but I couldn’t see it. I couldn’t afford to waste any money, though, so I lay down flat and looked under the car. The penny was there. I reached it out, and got up on my knees; and that was when I realized that there was a car coming very slowly up Nassington Road.
    People don’t normally drive that slowly. I stayed there crouched down, trying to get a glimpse at it between the parked cars. It was blue, and Jaggers’ little Austin 1100 was blue, too. I held my breath. It kept coming slowly, slowly. I stayed as low and as close to the parked car as I could. The blue car came on: and then when it got right next to the one I was hiding behind, it stopped.
    â€œWho’s there behind that car? I see you, Quincy, come out of there.”
    But I knew he wasn’t sure whether he’d seen anybody or not. If he’d seen me he wouldn’t have yelled, he’d have jumped out of the car and grabbed me. So I stayed scrunched up against the car, my hearting beating like crazy, trying to keep my breath from getting too loud; and in a minute he started the car again and drove slowly on up Nassington. Then I jumped up and started running. It seemed pretty sure to me that he would figure I was trying to make a phone call again, and head for South End Green. You pretty much had to go through South End Green to get to the Belsize Station, which meant I should head for Hampstead. I tore along until I came to a turning called South Hill Park. There’s a tricky little pathway leading off South Hill Park between some houses, that comes onto the Heath. I raced through there, and then began running across the Heath as fast as I could. When Jaggers didn’t find me in South End Green there was no telling where he would try next. Everywhere in London is full of tiny little streets going every which way; Hampstead is that way too, so I knew it would be hard for him to find me. But I was pretty worried anyway. So I kept on running, slowing down to walk when my lungs began to ache and burn, and then speeding up again when I caught my breath. Finally I got off the Heath and onto the streets again. I wasn’t exactly sure how to get to the tube station, but I knew the general direction, and I kept working my way along this little street and that one until I came onto Hampstead High Street. The tube station was right there.
    Luckily, they have very good maps in the London tube stations, and it wasn’t too hard for me to figure out how to get to St. Paul’s. Hampstead was on the Northern Line. All I had to do was take the tube down to Tottenham Court Road, change to the Central Line, and it was only three stops after that. Still, considering everything, it was four o’clock